Africa-Press – Tanzania. THE Minister for Health, Community Development, Gender, Elderly and Children Dr Doroth Gwajima yesterday highlighted some key areas which need improvement in the health sector in order to realise the government objectives in providing better services to the public.
The newly-sworn in Health Minister said although the sector has recorded some achievements, there were challenges which if addressed, will attract more people seeking services from public health facilities and generally improve the sector.
Dr Gwajima was speaking to her ministry’s staff when she reported for duty a day after she was sworn-in on Wednesday at State House in Dodoma.
She mentioned human resources management as one of the areas which needed to be improved to ensure that employed health staff delivers to the expectation of the employer.
Dr Gwajima noted that although the health personnel were not enough but there was a need to ensure effective use of the Workload Indicators of Staffing Need (WISN) tool to control them.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO) WISN is a human resource management tool which provides health managers a systematic way to make staffing decisions in order to manage their valuable human resources well.
“There are some health staff who use most of their work time on their private issues instead of serving people … such personnel should be controlled,” Dr Gwajima insisted.
She also added that new health staff should undergo induction, coaching and mentorship programmes to make them understand the systems and procedures and maximize their efficiency.
Dr Gwajima also stressed the need to improve distribution of health personnel to ensure that all health facilities get the required staff.
The minister further directed the ministry’s executives to come up with a system that will help in tracking revenue and records of people attending health facilities for proper management of the resources.
“There are some health facilities which have been allocated medical drugs but they don’t have records on how the medicines have been dispensed … they lack records on revenue collected and the patients who visit the hospitals,” she said.
Dr Gwajima also stressed the need for improving customer care in health facilities in order to make people enjoy the services .
“Service delivery is also an issue … the government has built dispensaries and health centres across the country but still some people do not use them. It is important to ask ourselves whether they enjoy our services … there is a need for preparing guidelines for customer care to improve service delivery,” she insisted.
The minister, however, said that the health sector can reduce dependence on the government if there will be clear strategies and plans to ensure smooth operations.
She noted that provision of better health services depend on cooperation between the ministry’s leaders and other staff.
“You should cooperate with permanent secretaries … There are a number of issues which need to be done by health experts and PSs … we should all work together to ensure that we attain our objectives.
